Research Progress on Sand Desertification in Qinghai Plateau

At present,the source region in Qinghai of the three big rivers of China,with the most seriously ecological environment of desertification,is the most important one in ecological environment construction of our country.Therefore,researches on the sandy desertification in this region are of great significance.In present years,a lot of achievements on desertification and its control have been got.This paper reviewed the research progress on desertification of Qinghai plateau from the end of 1950s to the early 21 century,including scientific surveying,desert distribution,basic desertification characteristics,sand dune types and their formation and evolvement,law of blown sand movement,filed observation and desertification monitoring,and experiment of sand prevention and control,etc.Researches related to the five desertified land distributing areas: Qaidam basin,Gonghe basin,Qinghai lake basin,source region of Huanghe river and source region of Changjiang river.Accordingly,the problems existed in the above research fields and the contents need further study were put forward in the paper.